The invention relates to a ground covering for sports areas and in particular for tennis courts and a method for producing a corresponding ground covering.
Coverings for sports areas and in particular also for tennis courts are known in the state of the art. Normally, ground coverings for tennis courts specifically are divided into two basic categories, namely hard courts on one hand and sand or respectively brick dust courts on the other hand, wherein the latter are also called “clay courts”.
Hard courts have relatively good play properties, namely a consistent ball bounce and a high ball speed. Moreover, hard courts require little maintenance and no watering. Conventional hard courts are disadvantageous due to their relatively high construction costs, the high ball and shoe abrasion, a high ball bounce as well as a high stress on the ligaments, tendons and joints of the athletes or respectively players due to the blunt and hard surface.
In the contrast, the advantages of sand courts are low construction costs, a low ball speed, longer ball exchanges, good dampening properties as well as advantageous turning and sliding properties of the athletes or respectively players. The disadvantages of sand courts are the comparatively higher maintenance, only low freeze resistance, the need to be constantly watered as well as inconsistent ball bounce.
Due to the described advantages and disadvantages, it was already attempted in the state of the art to reproduce the play and slide behavior of a sand court tennis covering in the case of simultaneously improved maintenance properties.
Thus, e.g. EP 0 358 209 A2 discloses a tennis court covering with a first layer made of an elastic polymer material and a second layer made of hard sand reinforced with a binder. A non-reinforced brick dust layer is provided as the sliding layer.
However, this type of covering is problematic due to the permanent grating of the scattered sliding layer so that a high abrasion and thus wear of the covering results. Besides the need for frequent maintenance due to the wear, the water permeability through the sliding material crushed in this manner also decreases greatly even after a short period of play. The covering becomes hereby mainly water-impermeable, which greatly impairs controlled start and stop movements by the athletes or respectively players as well as the sliding properties of the covering specifically needed in tennis. Thus, in the case of this type of covering, the play properties are considerably degraded even after a short period of play.